Meallady v. City of New London
| Decision Date | 07 February 1933 |
| Citation | 164 A. 391,116 Conn. 205 |
| Court | Connecticut Supreme Court |
| Parties | MEALLADY v. CITY OF NEW LONDON. |
Appeal from Superior Court, New London County; Patrick B O'Sullivan, Judge.
Action by Catherine Meallady against the City of New London to recover damages for personal injuries, alleged to have been sustained by the plaintiff as the result of a fall upon an icy sidewalk in the defendant city, brought to the superior court and tried to the jury. Verdict and judgment for the plaintiff, and appeal by the defendant.
Thomas E. Troland, of New London, for appellant.
Edward G. McKay, of Norwich, for appellee.
The appeal is from the refusal of the trial court to set aside the verdict as contrary to the law and the evidence. It is contended that the jury was not justified in finding (1) that the plaintiff was free from contributory negligence, or (2) that reasonable supervision by the city of its streets and sidewalks would have disclosed the slippery condition complained of by the plaintiff.
The plaintiff's own testimony furnished the only direct evidence as to her conduct at the time she fell. She fell as she was crossing the street. She was wearing a pair of new rubbers, and testified that before leaving the sidewalk she saw that it was icy in the street and looked because she wanted a safe place to cross and there was none, " but I thought I could make it." She then started to cross and fell when she took her second step from the sidewalk. Though she knew of the icy condition of the street, she was not guilty of contributory negligence as a matter of law in attempting to pass over it. She was not bound to take another course, but simply to use a degree of care proportioned to the danger involved. Lucy v. Norwich, 93 Conn. 545, 549, 106 A. 762; Blake v. City of Waterbury, 105 Conn. 482, 484, 136 A. 95. The jury could have found that the plaintiff observed where she stepped and though she failed to describe with greater particularity the manner in which she was proceeding, it could properly have reached the conclusion that she was in the exercise of reasonable care. Wood v Danbury, 72 Conn. 69, 43 A. 554; Schroeder v. City of Hartford, 104 Conn. 334, 132 A. 901.
There was little, if any, dispute as to the location and character of use of the sidewalk and street at the scene of the accident, nor as to the nature and character of the surface of the ground and its slippery condition at the spot where the plaintiff fell. The weather conditions prior to and at the time of the accident were established by the records of the weather bureau. The jury could reasonably have found the following facts: The plaintiff fell at the corner of Bayonet street and Graham court, about a mile from the center of the defendant city. Bayonet street is a residential street running north and south, and Graham court, which is a dead-end street about 200 feet long, intersects it from the west but does not cross it. Bayonet street is 40 feet wide with a traveled part of macadam 34 feet in width, and shoulders of dirt or gravel 3 feet in width. There are concrete sidewalks on both streets, and at the corner the dirt shoulder slopes down from the sidewalk to the traveled part of Bayonet street. There is no crosswalk at this point. On January 11, 1931, at about 10:15 a. m., the plaintiff approached the corner upon the sidewalk on the north side of Graham court with the intention of crossing to the east side of Bayonet street. The sidewalk was clear of ice or snow, but there was a coating of ice on the sloping gravel shoulder of the road. She stepped from the sidewalk and slipped and fell upon the icy surface of the dirt after taking a step or two. There was a snowstorm on December 22 23, and 24 with a fall of seven and seven-tenths inches, another on December 27 with a fall of one and six-tenths inches, and one on December 30 with a fall of six-tenths of an inch. It rained from 3 p. m. on January 5 to 3 p. m. on January...
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